The paper feels strange to your fingertips. It's dry and flakey; you have folded and unfolded the corner of the page so many times that you are becoming worried that you might accidentally rip it off. It wouldn't be an issue if it was your own book, but you are renting it from the library and you would feel incredibly guilty if you damaged the book. You should stop playing with the pages. But you are a fiddler. You can't help it.

A deep and lulling voice pierces through the empty silence like a bullet through the air.

"Good book?"

Your heart stops and your whole body jolts. The library book with the creased pages slips out of your hands and falls into your lap. You have lost your place in the story and your train of thought. You look up towards the light pouring through the open door, your eyes focusing on the shadowed figure standing in the suture of illumination and abyss. The tall, lengthy, sharp figure crosses into the darkness of the room, fading into the pure black space, making their way towards you. With each step closer, mute and gentle like a feline, your heart pounds louder and harder in your head like a heavy and deep drum.

You sputter for a moment, finding it hard to sew your thoughts into sentences. You take a moment to pull your words together and push out a simple yes.

Beside you is your phone, facing down, with a beam of yellow light from the flashlight shooting up at the ceiling. The figure walks up to you and leans against the wall. Their back scratches the wall as they lower themself down to the floor to sit. Their legs stretch out as they fit into the place by your side. Your skin tingles and the little hairs on your arms stick up straight as trees. The glow of your flashlight defines the face of the figure.

Lilyth Hellen has the most beautiful face you've ever seen. It doesn't matter what light or what darkness she's in, she's always hauntingly picturesque- especially in the brightness of the phone's light.

Her pine green eyes seem to glow like a full moon, contrasting against the thick ink of her mascara and the dense fog of her smokey eye. Her makeup is messy and smeared, like coal dust, all except for her blood-red lipstick. Her lips are neat and crisp enough to cut metal clean through. In the spots where her face is untouched by makeup, you can see her skin, soft and clear. There's no scar, blemish, pimple, or imperfection to be seen, nor is there a trace that there ever was any in the first place. Her face is shrouded by her long, soft, black hair, without a single strand out of place. She's like someone you'd see in one of those old portraits; pretty, pristine, perfect. She's smiling at you, with her grave green gaze.

You suddenly realize that you have been staring for far too long and the pit in your stomach grows wider. Heat rises to your cheeks as a flickering flame. You turn away from her and focus on the book in your lap. You hope you're not visibly blushing.

You ask her what's up, though you already have a guess as to why she's here with you.

"I wanted to find you," her voice is a low, hypnotic drawl that sends shivers down your spine. Even when she's speaking she sounds like a song. "I wanted to talk about your message."

There isn't a hint of awkwardness or discomfort in her voice. She's just as undaunted and accoy as she always is. A little odd given the subject matter, but not out of character for her.

The flames in your cheeks rage bigger and hotter. You're certain that if you weren't red-faced before, you are now. You let out a shaky breath which sounds like a soft 'ah.'

Right, you say, nowhere near as sturdy as she is.

She doesn't look away from you as she speaks, even though you wish to vanish out of her sight and into the darkness. Perhaps even for forever.

"It's endearing that you feel that way for me-"

You cut her off, dread like poison pumping through your veins as you guess that she doesn't feel the same way for you.

You had a feeling when you sent that text, an awful, sickly, cold feeling, that someone as ethereal as Lilyth Hellen could never feel even the slightest bit of what you feel for her.

What you feel for her is almost inhuman. It's obsessive. It's too much. She never leaves your brain and every thought you have is always one about her. You can never get her out of your mind, and whenever you try, and oh how you've tried, she always drowns out all other thoughts in seconds.

You always think about her smile and the way it draws all attention to her, or about her cat-like eyes and the way they stare intensely as if whatever she is staring at is of the utmost importance, or about her hair and the way it bounces with grace when she moves. You think about whenever she brushes your arm accidentally, or taps your shoulder, or moves a piece of your hair into place and how you fall into a daze over how soft her hands are and how gentle her touch is. You think about the way her laugh and her voice make your heart flutter like a snare. You think about the way butterflies swarm inside of you whenever she is with you. You think about how your chest squeezes and clenches in a way that is so painful that it burns whenever she isn't around. You think about what you'd say when she was with you again. You never have felt this way, this intensity, towards anyone before.

Not until Lilyth.

The only escape from the storm of never-ending thoughts is reading, and even then that sometimes fails.

"What I feel for you is..." there's a moment of split silence before she finishes, "complicated. I do feel something for you, but it's hard to explain."

You crinkle your eyebrows, and you dare to look up from your lap. You turn your head to the side and stare at her, unsure what to think- unsure what to feel.

While it wasn't what you wanted to hear, it's not what you expected to hear either. You didn't think that you could physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually handle a 'no,' but 'complicated' is something maybe even worse: it gives you hope. At least if she said that she didn't have feelings, you wouldn't have to hold onto her so tightly anymore. At least you could move on and maybe, just maybe, stop feeling all of the millions of feelings that were so heavy that sometimes it hurt.

As she said, feelings are complicated.

You ask her to clarify. You want to ask her to at least try to explain what she means, for your pitiful and pathetic sake. But you don't.

"Let me put it this way," You watch her face as she crawls from beside you to in front of you, sitting down on her ankles. You have nowhere to look but into her dilated and focused forested eyes. She places her hand on the ground to the left of you, stabilizing herself. You have nowhere to go, now. Not that you ever want to leave. Your cheeks are getting redder and hotter and you hope you don't start sweating. It's getting harder to think. It's getting easier to feel.

She leans in. Your heart is beating faster. She leans in. Your breathing is getting shaky. She leans in. Your pulse is thumping louder in your head. She leans in. Your mouth is drying out. She leans in. Your stomach is squirming. She leans in. Your fingers are tingling. She leans in. Your lips are quaking. She leans in. Your brain is completely blank except for one thought. She leans in. Your eyes are locked on her lips.

She stops just a few inches from your face, and she jerks, eyes looking down at your chest.

You flinch.

It feels as if you've been punched by one swift and strong swing to your chest. All the air inside of you is shoved out of your lungs the same way a balloon deflates. Your body is completely stiff and yet completely limp. For a moment, you can't feel much of anything. You're numb. You force yourself to look away from her and glance down.

There's a knife in your chest. There's a small knife in your chest. There's a small, black knife in your chest. There's a small, black knife with blood spilling on it in your chest. There's a small, black knife with your blood spilling on it in your chest. There's a small, black knife with your blood spilling on it in your chest that Lilyth put there.

Lilyth has stabbed you.

There's a burning now- like you're on fire. But this time it's not just your cheeks, it's everywhere. Sweat breaks out across your skin and tears water up in your eyes. It's hot. It's so hot. It's too hot.

Through the pain, you move your arm to your chest, gingerly touching the wound. You hiss and whimper from the stinging. You move your shaking hand up to your face, and see deep, Lilyth red-lipstick blood coating your fingertips.

You breathe out a string of incoherent words as your tears fall down your face. You hardly even notice that you're crying; you can't feel anything but pain: unbearable, unthinkable, all thought-consuming pain.

You're confused. You're scared. You're hurt. You're not sure what hurts you more: the stab wound or the fact that Lilyth gave you you the stab wound.

Smooth fingertips brush against your knuckles and pull your hand down. You force yourself to look away from your hand and glance up.

Lilyth stares at you like a predator watches it's prey. She lets go of your hand and cups your cheek with such an agonizing tenderness that it draws more tears from your eyes and cries from your lips.

You want to ask why she's done this. But you don't.

Your vision is blurred, but you can tell that the light from your flashlight has gone out. The only light coming into the room is from the open doorway, far, far away.

She leans in. Your eyes are locked on her lips.
Suddenly, her red covered lips are pressed against your tear covered ones. Like her hands, they're soft and gentle.

There's a new kind of burning inside of you, a good kind. You can barely feel the stinging anymore. You don't want her to pull away. You don't want her to every pull away. You have no energy to move, but you use the last of your fleeting strength to lean in. The kiss lingers for a second or so more, you can't tell, and Lilyth finally pulls away. Your lips, the only part of you, feel bitterly cold. You fall back against the wall gasping for air that you can't reach.

She grabs your phone and puts it in her pocket. Then she reaches towards your chest, grabs her small, black knife that's coated in your blood, and yanks it out with ease. You yelp so quietly that it can't even be classified as a yelp. She picks up your library book with folded corners and dry and flakey pages and opens it up. She places the the knife into the middle book, and closes it. She grabs the handle and slowly pulls out the knife, a little less blood on it than before. She once again opens the book, to a new and clean page, and wipes the remaining blood off of the knife and onto the pages. She folds the book closed and places it softly onto your lap.

Lilyth slips the knife into her other pocket, and pushes herself up onto her feet.

"Like I said, it's complicated," Lilyth says, still undaunted and accoy. You notice that her lipstick is still perfect, unsmeared, untouched.

You can do nothing but watch as she turns away from you and walks away. She crosses the seam between the light and dark in the doorway, and vanishes just as quickly and quietly as she had arrived.

You want to call for help.

But you don't.